The Grand Old Woman of Egyptology

Anglo-Indian Egyptologist, archaeologist, anthropologist, historian and folklorist, Margaret Murray was the Manchester Museum’s first curator of Egyptology, and the first woman in Britain to hold a full-time appointment in the subject.

She directed the unwrapping of the mummies of the Two Brothers – found in the finest non-royal tomb-group of the Middle Kingdom – in the University’s Chemical Theatre, in front of 500 enthusiasts, on 6 May 1908.

The process took one-and-a-half hours, and Murray’s multidisciplinary scientific study of the Two Brothers changed existing attitudes towards the examinationof mummified remains.